Mindful Marketing

Phil: Let's talk a bit about mindfulness. You know, probably about four or five years ago in our annual trend report, we highlighted mindfulness as one of the top 10 trends. And now there's this new report from the health marketing team. They just published their mental wellbeing category report. And what they have, have issued is the proclamation that they've now entered. We have now entered the third phase of health as consumer interest in health shifts from physical to mental. 

Phil: Also what we're, what we're finding is because of Covid 19, clearly depression rates have tripled over the course of the first year of the pandemic. And the climate crisis is another influencing factor according to their global survey and peer reviewed study led by Bath University and was published in Lancet. 75% of young people think the future is frightening. Can you imagine that Sally three outta four people think that the future is frightening? 45% say the climate concern negatively impacts their day. And nearly 60% of young people say that they feel worried or extremely worried about the future. Hello. You know, what are we gonna do if we've got all these younger generation people, this nervous, this, you know, anxiety, you know, driven you know, kind of future world are, are we gonna have? So what we're now seeing is a lot more effort towards, you know, having more functional foods that deal with our mental ability. 

Sally: Yes. And this is, this is really a great trend. It comes on the heels of the pandemic where everyone was looking for immune boosting products and, and healthy foods. But then, you know, we did see an uptick in depression, and I think we're seeing people addressing their mental state, and particularly their sleep. They wanna eat foods that will help them sleep. And we're looking at things that are a part of that microbiome, which is, you know, is what we're talking about in the gut microbiome where all those viruses and bacterias live that are good and bad, but have a symbiotic relationship. And so we want, we're looking for foods that balance that so that we can be healthy, but also feel really good mentally. 

Phil: Yeah. And, and it's an important thing to, to address. And, you know, for those of you that wanna know more besides this article, go to the American Psychological Association. They do a report every year called Stress in America, and some great findings there that, that really, number one, are gonna scare you what's going on, but also offering ways that we can do this and certainly this mind-body connection with the foods that we can help a lot, whether it's sleep, whether it's just, you know, calming us down. We don't need drugs to do that. We just need to eat, you know, better food.